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Dirigist Bloc
This country is part of the Altverse universe. |religion = Alithianism |demonym = Dirigist, Oceanian |government_type = }} |leader_title1 = |leader_name1 = Maurice Williams |leader_title2 = |leader_name2 = Yvonne Bernadotte |leader_title3 = |leader_name3 = Oscar Wallace Scott |legislature = |sovereignty_type = Independence from the |established_event1 = |established_date1 = 28 November 1827 |established_event2 = |established_date2 = 11 May 1830 |established_event3 = |established_date3 = 17 October 1865 |area_rank = 6th |area_magnitude = |area_km2 = 8920894 |percent_water = 2.6% |population_estimate = 95,738,106 |population_estimate_rank = 13th |population_estimate_year = 2016 |population_census = 89,304,505 |population_census_year = 2010 |population_density_km2 = 10.7 |population_density_sq_mi = |population_density_rank = 220th |GDP_PPP = $4.628 trillion |GDP_PPP_rank = 5th |GDP_PPP_year = 2016 |GDP_PPP_per_capita = $48,348 |GDP_PPP_per_capita_rank = 15th |GDP_nominal = $4.424 trillion |GDP_nominal_rank = 3rd |GDP_nominal_year = 2016 |GDP_nominal_per_capita = $46,215 |GDP_nominal_per_capita_rank = 13th |Gini = 32.8 |Gini_rank = |Gini_year = 2015 |HDI_year = 2015 |HDI = 0.924 |HDI_change = increase |HDI_rank = 4th |currency = Work credit (wk) |currency_code = WKR |time_zone = (DST)}} |utc_offset = +8 to +12 |time_zone_DST = |utc_offset_DST = +9 to +13 |date_format = dd-mm-yyyy AD |drives_on = right |cctld = .db |calling_code = +6 }}The Dirigist Bloc, officially the Amalgamated Bloc of Dirigist States (ABDS), and often known interchangeably as Oceania, is a located in on the continent of , and the neighboring islands of , , , , and . It is neighbored by and located to the north and west of the nation; and the island nation of to the northeast. It is a dirigist state which operates as a , in which the is elected by the citizenry, but wields authoritarian power over the other branches of government. The center of government is located in the city of Defiance, which is also the largest city in the nation. Divided into XX sectors and XX special districts, the nation's government maintains a strict leash on all public and private activities, and is for all legitimate purposes, a . The Dirigist Bloc is , spanning a total area of 8,920,894 km2 (3,444,376 sq mi), as well the with a population of more than 95.7 million as of 2016. The Dirigist Bloc was originally home to a native population of who colonized the continent more than 50,000 years ago. These natives spoke more than 250 different languages, and were one of the oldest human ethnic groups in the world at the time. The neighboring islands of and Aotearoa were settled by the , with the latter colonized around 1400 AD by the , one of the Polynesian peoples of the region. Contact with the indigenous Australians and Māori, as well as the other islander populations were established in by the late-18th century, when the claimed the continent for themselves through one of its most famous explorers, . The island of New Guinea was colonized by the 40,000 years ago, and the first signs of irrigation evidenced to have begun around 10,000 years ago. The continent of Australia was designated a colony for who were intended to serve as cheap labor on the hostile and largely inhospitable mainland, and weather the native peoples' attacks on behalf of the British government and military. Dissatisfaction with the British authorities by the early-19th century led to the formation of an independence movement within the population of black Africans, and the Coup of 1827, followed by a declaration of independence during the Oceanic Proclamation. The colonists secured their independence following the three year-long Oceanian Revolution, in which their sovereignty was recognized by Great Britain in 1830. The rise of dirigism in the 1850s would lead to the Oceanian Civil War by 1860, and the establishment of first ever dirigist state in the world following the adoption of its constitution in 1865. The Dirigist Bloc grew quickly as regional power, invading and annexing the islands of Fiji, Kanaky (New Caledonia), New Guinea, and Vanuatu, and establishing a sphere of influence throughout the rest of the . The nation often served as a major power broker between the European empires and the local East Asian states seeking to negotiate on an equal footing with the West. The Dirigist Bloc's role during the and the . The country developed one of the most advanced economies in the world during the 19th and 20th centuries, and by the dawn of the turn of the century, was widely regarded as entirely self-sufficient agriculturally and industrially. The standard of living in the Dirigist Bloc often exceeded that in other nations in the world, surpassing even the and as the world's most economically prosperous nations per capita. Remaining neutral during the , the Dirigist Bloc was spared the devastating effects of the later , and remained economically stable throughout the period. The nation did join the Allies during the , after fears of a drove the government to support the Allies. The Dirigist Bloc gained international notoriety for its role during the war, and leveraged its position to promote dirigism throughout the world, leading to the creation of the Fourth World under Dirigist control. The Dirigist Bloc eventually ended its attempts at foreign political expansion, and took a neutral stance throughout the rest of the , seeking to maintain its relatively peace and prosperity in the region. Since then, the country has grown into an and , as well as a wielding the world's third-largest and most advanced economy. Also wielding what some consider to be disproportionate power and influence for its size and location, the Dirigist Bloc is an active supporter of , and has sent troops abroad to support or remove regimes according to its independence foreign policies. Because of the Dirigist Bloc's support for authoritarian governments and military adventurism, the country is widely condemned in foreign media and politics, and typically labeled as a removed from international affairs. The nation is also criticized for having sacrificed many individual rights and freedoms for its citizens in pursuit of development and national security and stability. Etymology Before colonization in 1770, the name Australia was used by European geographers for the primary landmass of the same name, which had been discovered in 1606 by the Dutch navigator . The name was derived from the Latin Terra Australis ("southern land"), and first appeared in 1625 when English cleric, , published his book Hakluytus Posthumus, a corruption of the original Spanish "Austrialia del Espíritu Santo" (Southern Land of the Holy Spirit), which originally denoted the neighboring islands of . The Dutch would use the term Australische in 1638 to describe the newly settled lands to the south of their , in a book published in the city of . Several attempts to have the term used as the new name for the continent were made by individuals such as , the government of one of the colonies on the continent. However, his recommendation to the British Admiralty to use Australia as the continent's name were instead denied, and rather, the name Oceania used to describe the landmass. Oceania came from the French Océanie, originally pinned by in 1812. The name came from the Latin oceanus, which the Admiralty deemed to be a more fitting name for the region that the general "southern land" denoted by the name Australia, leading them to officially christen the land Oceania in 1824. The term "Dirigist Bloc" hails from the 1865 constitution adopted by the colonists following the Oceanian Civil War against republican rule. The full phrase "Amalgamated Bloc of Dirigist States" appears in the first draft of the constitution, and accepted as the official name of the newly independent nation by the government, and persists through later drafts of the constitution. In the final draft of the constitution, it is stated in the opening that "We the People of Oceania establish this as the Constitution of the Amalgamated Bloc of Dirigist States." Later debate over the shortened form for the name within the government and public sphere, resulted in a later law in 1831, clarifying that the term "Dirigist Bloc" can be used as the formal version of the long name, while "Oceania" may be used in informal settings where a less political name might be needed for discussion. Today, the term "Dirigist Bloc" and "Oceania" are often used interchangeably, as well as "Dirigist" and "Oceanian", much in the same manner as "Soviet" and "Russian" were used during the Soviet era. Citizens of the Dirigist Bloc are referred to as and "Oceanian", while "Dirigist" dominates most other forms of reference such as "Dirigist values" and "Dirigist forces", given the complete saturation of dirigism throughout Oceanian culture and society. However, because of the growth of dirigism beyond the nation, in the media, "Oceanian" is typically used to separate the two from one another when speaking of dirigism in other parts of the globe. History Prehistory Pre-European history The continent of was settled by humans nearly some 50,000 years ago, when people probably from , migrated to the continent via . It was from these early humans that the later most likely descended. By the time Europeans arrived on the mainland, the native Australian inhabitants had not progressed beyond simple hunter-gatherer societies, though all possessed rich oral histories and complex spiritual traditions, as well as a universal concept known as the . In other parts of the region were the sister islands of , home of the known as the . Aotearoa had been settled by the Polynesians fairly late in human history, with the first inhabitants arriving on the islands sometime between 1250 and 1300 AD. Unlike the Aboriginals of Australia, the Māori had developed a more complex society with advanced agriculture and fishing capabilities, and were more stratified as a society with a rigid caste system and tribal organization. Discovery and exploration The first recorded sighting of and first landfall on the Australian mainland by a European is widely attributed to Dutch navigator, . He discovered the continent in 1606 after sighting the , and made landfall on 26 February of that year at the . The Dutch mapped all of the northern and western shorelines and named the newly discovered landmass later on that century, but never established any colonies or settlements. Later on, English explorer returned to the continent between 1688 and 1699, landing on the northwestern coast, but likewise made no attempts at settlement. For much of its early history, the mainland was deemed to inhospitable for colonization given the apparent lack of accessible freshwater. For much of the period after that, the southern portion of Australia remained unexplored, though the eastern regions would be thoroughly mapped. In 1642, passed through the waters east and south of Australia, and discovered the islands of Aotearoa and , as well as the island of , later named after him two centuries thereafter. In 1770, mapped the eastern coastline of the continent, naming the area he explored "New South Wales, and claiming it for . would return between 1797 and 1799, circumnavigating the island of Tasmania as well as exploring the extreme southeastern coastlines of the continent. It wouldn't be until 1801 when finally circumnavigated Australia, and confirm the landmass as a true continent. Flinders would also be the first individual to map the southern half of the continent, completing map of Australia and finalizing the geographical shape for navigators, though it wouldn't be until 1811 that a complete map of the continent was finally published. Colonial era Colonization The first major attempt to colonize the continent came in 1783, when the British sought to transfer freed slaves from the Americas to Australia, following the end of the that year. The British government could not find subjects willing to uproot and move to the hostile continent, and deemed the black African freedmen as potential candidates for the colonization of the Australian continent. In a letter to British prime minister, , Captain of the , responsible for the colony's establishment, suggested that black Africans could serve as the new colonial population given their resistance to malaria, high heat, and tropical conditions, based on their residence in Africa and the American South. On Phillip's recommendation, Prime Minister Pitt agreed to transfer thousands of former American slaves to Australia, providing incentives to their moving to the continent. These included vast tracts of land, the right to bear arms to combat the indigenous population, and the right to possess a local government and judiciary, seeking to avoid the same mistake they made in . of the , in a letter to British Prime Minister , 1783}} Spearheaded by merchant and former slave, Simeon Carter-Moore, much of the African American population in Canada agreed to the deals offered by the British government, and began their voyage to Australia as part of the First Fleet, under the command of Captain Phillip. The First Fleet would embark from in , and begin its four month journey to where it would land and establish the first British colony in Australia. The settlement of Defiance would grow to become the most important area on the continent, as more and more settlers from the freed black population in North America migrated to Australia. Van Diemen's Land was later colonized in 1803, and later became its own separate colony in 1825 as grew independently of New South Wales. Expansion into the resource-rich regions outside of the city of Defiance became a priority for the colonists, conflict with the native Aborigines led to the formation of the colony's first organized militia in 1823. The islands of Aotearoa were colonized by the early-1800s, when the first black African was born on the in 1815. The first permanent settlement on the islands was that of established in 1822. By the mid-1820s, most of the region was colonized, and had grown remarkably, with a total population of 290,985 non-native individuals in Australia and another 27,893 in Aotearoa, according to 1820 Oceania Census. Much of the growth had been attributed to the popularity of the British government's land grants and protection from slavery for the black population, as well as the encouragement of having as many children as possible to help bolster the growing economy of the colonies. The indigenous population at the same time had been decimated, dropping from a peak of one million to nearly 350,000 by the 1820 census. Much of the death toll was blamed on the introduction of new diseases the aboriginals had no immunity against, as well as the state-sanctioned displacement of indigenous peoples opposing the colonization of their ancestral lands. British rule From the time of colonization in 1788, the British governed the territories of British Oceania, with the territory consisting of a number of colonies, such as New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land. The British provided a number of incentives and liberties denied to other colonies at the time to attract colonists to the land, but had to settle for freed slaves brought from the former territory of British America as the new population base. Fears of a local rebellion in the same light as that of the now independent United States led to generous concessions by the British authorities, though given that the majority of the black population consisted of loyalists, the fears disappeared over time. From 1788 to 1827, expansion of the colonies became a high priority for the British as the Dutch sought to expand their holdings in the East Indies to the chagrin of the British. Exploration and expansion into the interior of Australia began following pioneer farmer August Gallagher's famous , which allowed for the growth of the colonies of Botony Bay through the originally believed impassible mountains, and into the rich and fertile temperate lands of the interior. The Aborigines were widely suppressed by the African American colonists, and forced further and further inland as the British colonies grew in size and population. The colony's growth was such that a taxable population base was now feasible for the British government, and the establishment of a permanent garrison for the benefit of the people affordable both financially and politically. Dissatisfaction with British rule only began to gain ground following the wildly unpopular in 1824. Many of the soldiers for the campaign were drawn from the Oceanian population, which was closer to the theater of combat, and the funds drawn mostly from the taxes payed by the Oceanians. The came at the cost of local infrastructure development and investment into the defenses of the colony, which feared an attack by either the Dutch or Chinese pirates. When the British sought to expand their force in Burma to 50,000 troops by calling to service 20,000 Oceanian men, protests exploded throughout the colony, leading to the British government sending troops from the home islands to quash the unrest. This would ultimately fuel the growing independence movement in Oceania. Independence Coup of 1827 Ironically, in spite of the unpopularity of the war in Burma and the British government's demands for obedience, the colonists were indeed not opposed to either, though they sought to maintain their newly found identity as Oceanians rather than as British subjects. Having grown in relative isolation from the rest of the world, a culture of self-control, obedience to higher powers, and communal development had developed within Oceania. With few resources to start with and a hostile environment around them, the Oceanians had been forced to operate more as a unit and not as individuals as had been the case in North America. A strict hierarchy outside of the local colonial government was produced, and was more akin to the rigid caste system of the Indians and the Māori rather than the fluid social ladder in many parts of the Western world. Form and function as well as strict placement tests to help colonists make the most of individual skills dominated the lives of the people. Thus by the time of the coup, there were enough differences culturally and ideologically that the Oceanians saw themselves better off outside of the British Empire than within it. On 28 November 1827, Aidan Carter-Moore, the son of Simeon Carter-Moore, the man who spearhead the African American support for Oceania's colonization, made his famous Oceanic Proclamation outside of the Governor's House in Defiance. In front of a crowd numbering some 3,000 people, Carter-Moore declared that the people of Oceania would no longer serve as subjects of the King of Great Britain, and that it was now the time of the Oceanians to take over their own future. Taking the lead, he and his supporters stormed the Governor's House and dragging then Governor of New South Wales out to be tarred and feathered. The British garrisons throughout the colony were besieged, and local arsenals ransacked for their arms and munitions. The Free State of Oceania was declared later on that day, and the militias reorganized into the Free Army of Oceania. With the coup having been swift and bloodless, the 28th of November was known from then on as "White Wednesday". War with Great Britain The response from Great Britain was almost immediate. Refusing to lose yet another colony to local independence movements, the British government arranged to send 12,500 troops to Oceania with the intent of crushing the rebellion and placing its leaders on trial for treason. However, a number of problems arose during the course of the retaliation from the rest of the empire. Almost concurrently, the British Empire found itself drawn into three separate conflicts; the , the , and the , all of which were closer to home and two of which threatened the stability of Europe. With its forces overstretched with the wars in Europe and Africa, and the occupation of Burma in line with the , the British could only muster a force of 8,700 troops to send to confront the Oceanian rebels. Having anticipated a much larger force from the British, the Oceanians took no chances with their own army, breaking up into smaller units and opting to fight from the countryside, learning from the example of the Spanish guerrillas during the . The war itself was relatively short as far as a war of independence went. The British were often soundly defeated when forced to search the hills and mountains for the rebels, which was hampered by their lack of manpower. However, when they were able to take to an open field, most battles were either victories for the British, or very close draws for the rebels. The Dutch were convinced to support the Oceanians following the Battle of TBD, which helped the Oceanians gain material support against the British forces. Eventually, the British government of , the Duke of Wellington, decided that the costs of the war were of no benefit to the British authorities, and agreed to sit down for a peace deal. By this point in time, the British were seeking to redirect their military efforts to stop a string of slave rebellions in , as well as prepare for a potential crisis in , which was feeling the effects of the yet ongoing Portuguese civil war. Treaty of Defiance Aidan Carter-Moore, the head of the rebel government in Defiance, accepted the terms of peace from the British, who acknowledged Oceanian independence and sovereignty over the continent of Australia and the settled islands of Oceania. Because of the complexities of travel before the 1850s, the British had to send a delegation to the rebel capital, which at the time was under British control. Likewise, the Oceanians sent their own team to the city which consisted of wartime rebel leaders Aaron Riker, Edison Lee, William Silvington, and Horace Payne. Negotiations took place on 3 May 1830 after both sides agreed to a ceasefire, and took place at the TBD Hall. The British were willing to accept the full withdrawal of their forces as at the time of the negotiations, the colony itself, though prosperous, produced little of worth to the British economy as a whole. Wool, Oceania's primary export, was easily sourced from Scotland and Ireland, and was not of sufficient worth and quality to rationalize the costs of transport back to the home islands, or the costs of fighting a prolonged war on the continent far from the most profitable colonies of India and South Africa. As was the case with the American delegation in Ghent, the British diplomats refused to sit with their black Oceanian counterparts for a portrait, leaving the Oceanians with a half-complete painting of the negotiations down to the modern day. The Treaty of Defiance was signed 11 May 1830 by the Oceanian and British delegations, and brought to an end three years of fighting, ending with the formation of the Republic of Oceania. 19th century Post-war development Following the successful bid for independence from the United Kingdom, the Oceanians moved to develop their nation without the support of the British Empire. Without the developed goods provided by Britain, combined with the new nation's far-flung location in the South Pacific Ocean, the Republic of Oceania struggled to build a new future without their British overlords. In response to these challenges, Aidan Carter-Moore, Oceania's first president officially elected to the office in 1830, championed the focus on self-sufficiency and self-improvement without the reliance on European goods and ideologies. President Carter-Moore believed that Oceania would thrive by way of remaining committed to the unique culture of merit-based advancement and selfless devotion to the greater good of the many over the few that had developed in the cultural mindset of the colonists. All relics of British governance were abandoned, from the roles of state, management of honors and titles, to the very manner in which traffic was managed on the streets. All of this was geared toward the forging of a new culture divided from Western standards. Oceania seized the islands of Vanuatu and New Caledonia in 1831, after discovering the potential of sugar plantations there, and later seized the islands of Fiji in 1833 as a show of force, in a bid to project Oceania's regional power. In spite of his best efforts, Carter-Moore could not distract his fellow countrymen from the dire economic state of the nation. The value of the Oceanian pound continued to drop as the government failed to attract business to the continent. Foreign companies viewed Oceania as having few exploitable resources worth trading it, especially when the far more valuable spice trade of the Dutch East Indies was closer and more profitable. Likewise, the European empires were highly skeptical of Oceanian sovereignty and would often send whaling ships into Oceanian territorial waters in spite of Oceanian protests. The sinking of an Oceanian cutter in 1834 destroyed the public image of the nation's first president and champion of independence, and Carter-Moore opted not to run for re-election later that year. The issue of managing the country in a manner that helped to improve the quality of life at home and the image of the state abroad, became a matter of heated debate during the election of 1834. The victor of the election, Aaron Ryker, was one of the nation's founding fathers and a hawk in foreign affairs. Ryker pledged to protect Oceanian sovereignty from the Europeans, and in the wake of his election victory, embarked on a series military reforms he hoped would refine the defensive capabilities of Oceania's depleted fighting forces. Rifles were purchased from the Dutch and the French, but many were sabotages by British agents during the transportation process. Cannons ordered by Oceania for the Oceanian Navy were purposefully designed with flaws, and pressure from the British authorities in Southeast Asia prevented the French from providing equipment that the Oceanians might use to hamper British power in the region. By the 1840s, Ryker was deemed a failure as a president, and his name blackened by a series of sexual scandals involving aboriginal women located on his plantation. Disgraced, Ryker was refused the nomination of the Oceanian Republican Party in 1842, leading to his retirement by the start of the preliminary elections. Industrialization As the years came to pass, Oceania was faced by several seemingly insurmountable problems, such as workforce shortfalls, an increasingly devalued currency, and the inability to defend its waters from far more powerful European merchants and navies. However, in 1842 with the election of Henry Augustine, the nation's fortunes saw a turn for the better. In 1845, the President Augustine's cabinet used the government's meager coffers to provide incentives to Oceanian families which had more children to boost the nation's small population of just over a million people in 1840, to more than two and half million by 1850. This was combined with the influx of black Africans from other parts of the globe, enticed by attractive offer of land grants which had been the deciding factor which brought the ancestors of the Oceanians to the continent and surrounding territories. Augustine's government further championed the Black Oceania policy, which sought to build a utopia of sorts for blacks far from the oppression of slavery and discrimination in white nations and empires, ironically by passing laws to keep whites out of the virgin nation. Another boost to the nation's growth was the discovery of gold on the Australian continent in 1851 by government surveyors. This news was originally suppressed by the state with the belief being that its spread would attract the attention of the European powers, and renew efforts by the British to return to the continent by way of force. However, as information slipped into the public spaces, Augustine's government found itself forced to release news of the discovery to the people. Luckily for the government, the army had been rebuilt to a sufficient level where it could protect significant regions of the nation, and the British were distracted by developments between the Russians and the , which exploded into the . With the revenue gained through the new gold mines, Oceania was able to sponsor the first serious attempt at industrialization, beginning with the industrialization of the cotton farms in Australia and the wool factories of Aotearoa. The export of exotic fruits and sugar in the island territories also resolved many of the issues which plagued the young nation during the 1830s. Dirigist movements Oceanian Civil War 20th century World War I Great Depression World War II Cold War era Intervention in Korea Vietnam War The Forth World Contemporary history Geography The Dirigist Bloc is the fifth-largest nation in the world with a landmass spanning a total of 8,920,894 km2 (3,444,376 sq mi). The nation is largely located within the , with the islands of Aotearoa and the Solomon Islands resting on the edges of the plate, leading to constant earthquakes at many points of the year. The largest portion of the Dirigist Bloc is the continent of Australia, which is often referred to as the "island continent" for its size and isolation from the rest of world's major landmasses. In many cases, Australia is considered the . The rest of the nation's land is located within , most of which is controlled by the Dirigist Bloc, and remains mostly undeveloped with the tropical rainforests of New Guinea remaining untouched by human hands. The island of Aotearoa consists two major islands; or North Island, and or South Island, as well as five smaller inhabited islands; Stewart Island, the Chatham Islands, Great Barrier Island, d'Urville Island, and Waiheke Island. The two major islands are divided by the , which is about 22 kilometers (14 mi) at its widest point. North of Aotearoa is Fiji, which consists of 332 islands of which only 102 are actually inhabited, and to the direct west is Vanuatu, which consist of 65 inhabited islands our of 85 islands in total. Climate Biodiversity Environment Politics Government Administrative divisions Law and justice Foreign relations Military Economy Energy Transport Science and technology Infrastructure Demographics Urbanization Languages Religion Education Healthcare Culture Art Architecture Music Literature Media Cuisine Category:Dirigist Bloc